An Ohio newspaper reports that Americans are virtually powerless to correct damaging mistakes in their credit reports due to a failure of federal law to regulate credit-reporting agencies.

The Columbus Dispatch published Sunday the first of a four-part series looking at the three largest national credit-reporting agencies. The report said that even basic errors such as misspelled names have wrongly denied thousands of people the chance to buy homes or even open a checking account.

The newspaper analyzed nearly 30,000 consumer complaints to the Federal Trade Commission over 30 months beginning in 2009 and to attorneys general in 24 states.

A trade group representing the credit-reporting agencies says they strive daily to keep accurate information.